The Internet Body Shames Lela Rochon After Husband’s Apparent Affair
Film director Antoine Fuqua cheated on his wife for the public to see. Whether he kissed, caressed or penetrated actress and model Nicole Murphy – there is photographic evidence of an intimate exchange with a woman who is not his wife.
Cancel Fuqua. Done.
It should be so simple, but no – the social media masses want to break down what led Fuqua to do so. We’re branding Murphy with the scarlet letter and implying that Rochon is at fault for her straying husband. Fuqua is off the hook.
Let’s flash back to 1992 and 1995. Remember Boomerang and Waiting to Exhale? Lela Rochon was a beautiful actress on the brink of her career as an actress in a Hollywood that is very limiting for black women.
Today, Lela Rochon is still a beautiful woman. The 55-year old mother of two has a different physique now, but still beautiful nonetheless. It doesn’t appear that she has taken her wealth and fame to the many plastic surgeons in Hollywood who could in a few hours on the table return her to her 90s body.
Perhaps she’s happy with her body. Maybe a medical condition has caused her weight gain. The issue here is that her husband was kissing another woman in Italy and here we are dissecting Rochon’s body to justify his actions.
How sick is that?
A man cheats on his wife and it must be because the wife is no longer meeting his expectations.
Here is a lesson on the female body – it’s crazy beautiful and can be extremely exasperating. It stretches, it rips, it feeds, it nourishes, and it can become disfigured all to bring life into the world. While some women maintain seemingly perfect physiques, all of the female bodily struggles are not transparent. Some female bodies never return to familiarity after life changing procedures, hormonal imbalances and various medications.
As women, we can work out, eat right, do yoga and spread nothing but positive energy to every person we encounter and then be thrown completely off by a menstrual cycle that ushers in unbearable cramps, bloating and anxiety that borderlines trauma.
Antoine Fuqua is a parent through no physical sacrifices of his own. According to the masses on the Internet, ‘he probably isn’t attracted to his wife anymore,’ or ‘Nicole Murphy probably gave him the attention that his wife doesn’t’ and ‘maybe they have an arrangement now that Lela is fat.’
I wonder how many times during their 20-year marriage Fuqua has snored in Rochon’s face. How many times has she looked at him and been disgusted? How many indiscretions has she forgiven?
Imagine the hurt Rochon is experiencing. I’m certain she has shed a few tears in recent days. When her children try to console her – if she chooses to hint at a level of betrayal she’s feeling – the same people body shaming her will say she’s trying to tarnish the children’s image of their father. It’s a lose lose for Rochon and for so many women like her in the world.
The saddest dynamic to this Hollywood drama is the fact that there are women participating in the body shaming of Rochon. Knowing what all women are faced with in this world just by being women – there is no excuse for the shaming from fellow women.
Rochon has deleted all of her social media accounts in wake of the images of Fuqua. Of course she can retreat with her wealth and maybe that will ease the pain. Imagine the heartache and the lack of an escape that everyday women deal with in such situations.
By the way Fuqua is no looker. Perhaps he’s dedicated countless hours perfecting his body, because he knows that his face isn’t too memorable. Would he be appealing or worth defending if not for his notoriety? Money makes a lot of unattractive men more desirable if you didn’t know.
Society always beats up the woman and makes her the villain in domestic/marital matters. In case we’ve forgotten, marriage is supposed to be a commitment not based on looks.
